Originally Posted by
nodog
Opportunity is how you did it, cut the odds and then try and get that needle in a hay stack. Opportunity is king. Can't shoot what isn't there and over the years a good hunter learns where to be and when. The difference in scent control being important and it being not so important is when hunting an area the hunter doesn't know how to hunt yet, then it is very important. 4 years to learn a property is what I've always set as a time table to taking quality deer, in the mean time, I'm not into educating them on what to look for and what I do doesn't.
I saw the myth busters episode and have seen some tests, they are all flawed, fresh cut trails are what the dogs are picking up and what deer follow to the hunter. Turned up earth means food for deer. I had a bluetick coon hound, I know what he was doing and he was an amazing tracker. He could track down a deer almost like he'd watched it run and fall and just about as fast as the deer fled there. No test magic shows are needed for me to know what that kind of dog can do and why it did it, if you walk there it can follow and it is told to find you REWARD!. Same with deer except deer aren't looking for a man if they are following the trail, they are looking for what made it for sure, but they don't know what did it till they see or hear it while the unsuspecting hunter sits on stand fidgeting, making noise. If it was the stink of man and it was afraid of man it would be gone the first whiff.
Opportunity? You know nothing about me. I have hunted 9 different states, and all over those states, 90 % of the tim on public land. I shot mst of my bucks the 1st time I ever hunted a spot... It ain't luck, and it ain't "Opportunity"...
My skill comes from studyng buck behavior and noticing what they do and how they react... Scent stream touches them they smell you. I don't care how much you paid for your pants, they smell you...
I have watched crime dogs follow 3 day old human scent across concrete that hundreds of other humans have crossed since and find the exact trail of the exact person they sought. Deer smell 27% better than dogs... You can't beat a dog, you can't beat a deer.
I use milkweed to check air currents when hunting and scouting. Bottom line is people "think" there scent is blowing straight at the deer but it might not be... Thermal currents and terrain can carry the scent right over the deer or around it... When the deer hits the scent stream he smells you. Ain't nothing you can do to prevent that.
If you have ever been busted even once by a deer downwind while wearing your magc suit, it don't work...
The magic pixie suit won't hurt you, but the mind set that you can get away with something will...
People need to get away from buying "magic" products and focus on hunting skills. I kill my bucks on land where most people have a tough time killing dinks and does by hunting where they move in daylight and making sure they on't see, smell, or hear me... Pretty simple, yet most people don't get it. They want something they can just buy so they don't have to scout or work at it.